Two solitudes,

Our two days in Paris demonstrated to us the stark reality of two solitudes this amazing city is experiencing. Yesterday we were jostled and crammed into a world of immigrants, ethnic and visual minorities, and watched alarmed at armed and serious police stopping and examining the person and luggage of 'suspects' - usually with beards and dark skin. This was our first 20 minutes of Paris. That along with the robbery attempt made us wonder why we were here.

Today, we experienced the well-loved, luxurious and largely white part of Paris. The contrast was vivid. Bill's fitbit says we covered 20,093 steps so we did our all to see as much as possible. We started with breakfast in a sidewalk cafe a few blocks from our apartment on Ile de Cite. Then we found the subway and made our way to the Arc de Triomphe for a walk down the Champs Elysees. Most of Paris is closed today but we found the Petit Palais open and took in its small but wonderful permanent collection.
Subway tickets burning a hole in our pockets (we bought a package of ten) we decided to just take a detour to the Eiffel tower for a look. Once there the possibility of seeing Paris from the sky enticed us and we followed a snaking line for 90 minutes before taking the elevator up to the top! The view was more than worth the wait and gave us a chance to really see what we've seen and where we'd been. Paris is a city to appreciate from up high.
Back on subway (actually a train for this part) and back to our neighbourhood to walk past Notre-Dame again and then on to the restaurant where we had breakfast for an early dinner. People-watching from our outside table could have kept us there for even longer but we finally decided our feet could take one more hike through the district of Marais to see the Pompidou Center. National Geographic described this amazing building as "love at second sight" and I agree. Reading more about it helped me like it much more. Sadly it is closed today so we had no chance to appreciate the interior which is what the structure is all about.
We wound our way home - had to double back a couple of times when stopped by police who have blocked much of Ile de Cite off.
We liked the day a lot - feel we more than made up for our experience yesterday.